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Its been a week and a half since my last update on my Philippines & Micronesia project, and that depends mainly on poor Wi-Fi connection. Two typhoons have hit the Philippines during my stay, and they may also have affected Wi-Fi and internet connections.

Panglao Island lays just south of Bohol and is reached easily by a boat from Cebu City to Tagbilaran on the south side of Bohol. From there land transport will take you to Panglao Island across a bridge, and if you are going to the Alona Beach area, this ride will take approx half an hour. My photo above from 22 December 2016, pictures Alona Beach. Sadly there is not a single wastebasket on the beach, and a lot of plastic waste from lazy and careless tourists end up in the sea.

Balicasag Island is a popular diving spot south-west of Panglao, where sea turtles are frequently observed. Sea turtles are only one of the sea creatures that end up with plastic in their gut, disposed by humans into the oceans. My photo above from 23 December 2016, shows a sea turtle resting on some soft corals near Balicasag Island, a protected area that hopefully in the future will attract larger marine life. That is if human waste will not see a decline instead in those animals and corals there today.

My photo above from 24 December 2016 pictures the Chocolate Hills, that are probably Bohol's most famous tourist attraction. Most people who first see pictures of this landscape can hardly believe that these hills are not a man-made artifact. The Chocolate Hills consist of more than 1,200 hills. They are very uniform in shape and mostly between 30-50 meters high. These Hills are covered with grass, which at the end of the dry season, turns chocolate brown in colour

A Tarsier from Bohol is shown on my photo above from 24 December 2016. The Tarsier of the Philippines are threatened by the destruction of their natural forest habitat. For many years both legal and illegal logging and slash-and-burn agriculture have greatly reduced the forests where Tarsiers live, and reduced the population to a dangerously small size. If no action is taken now, the Philippine Tarsier can soon be added to the list of extinct species.

My last photo is me on the Sui-Slide Zipline in Loboc Eco Adventure Park, on 24 December 2016. This zipline is the highest and one of the longest in the Philippines, spanning 520m on the first cable and 460m on the second one. The starting point is at a height of 120m and 100m at the end. It is a thrilling ride that takes less than 30 seconds each way and you cross the Loboc River, seen on this photo, on both cables. There are of course both weight and length requirements for this zipline.

- I have been to Cebu City and Palau after Christmas and am now in Yap, Micronesia.

Jean Dar

One worldOne lifeOne moment

I have a passion for travelling, having visited multiple countries on six continents for longer or shorter periods throughout the years. My interests include a wide array of areas, spanning from creativity to scientific matters and culinary delights to physiology and beyond.

I speak fluently English and Swedish, and at best I do fairly well in Spanish, and less well in French.